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Maybe the Citizen Scientist is the answer? The ordinary person who is passionate about a subject yet has no formal Masters or PhD science qualification? Obviously, this is not ideal, but unless there is money for science to investigate, then any unpopular subject will not attract funding and will not be investigated in a scientific way.
What we dont need is for orthodox science and science-types to attack and denigrate the efforts of these people who are investigating these subjects for the rest of the population. That is both unhelpful and unprofessional and, since science is trying to promote itself as an authority on some matters, it better make an effort to embrace the other matters it cannot investigate. To me this appears as a dog-in-the-manger response and is evidenced by the kind of derisory remarks we get when subjects such as Bigfoot, Aliens, Ghosts, and anything else which has not yet been 'explained' by science. If it appears to me this way, then it probably appears to others in the same way. I am not unique and I represent a certain percentage of the population.
I know, the science done by Citizen Scientists may be poor and may not be done in the correct way, but it IS something which is being done and it might provide a basis for a proper scientific investigation should the money suddenly be forthcoming in the future. These investigations and data not be able to be cited in future papers, which seems to be everything to science, but at least it is a start to solving the problem. Without this start, nothing is ever known and we get even more tales and stories which remain undocumented.
An example of this may be the 411 missing persons investigations in national Forests. David Paulides was a policeman and not a scientist, but, as a policeman, he is a credible investigator - at least it was good enough when he was in the force, so I assume it is good enough now he is not in the force any longer. So what of the information he documents? The folks who go missing in the forests is a really important issue for all of us and which needs money and time spent to investigate.
So, how do we, as a society, investigate things which are reported and for which there is no funding?
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